Social media platforms: A primer for researchers

Abstract

Social media platforms play an increasingly important role in research, education, and clinical practice. As an inseparable part of open science, these platforms may increase the visibility of research outputs and facilitate scholarly networking. The editors who ethically moderate Twitter, Facebook, and other popular social media accounts for their journals may engage influential authors in the post-publication communication and expand societal implications of their publications. Several social media aggregators track and generate alternative metrics which can be used by researchers for visualizing trending articles in their fields. More and more publishers showcase their achievements by displaying such metrics along with traditional citations. The Scopus database also tracks both metrics to offer a comprehensive coverage of the indexed articles’ impact. Understanding the advantages and limitations of various social media channels is essential for actively contributing to the post-publication communication, particularly in research-intensive fields such as rheumatology.